Lok Sabha Elections 2024: What’s left of the Left in Kolkata?

Saira Shah Halim, CPM, candidate from the South Kolkata constituency

We've worn a red T-shirt with our red spectacles on, for fun, to fit in with the hammer and sickle, surrounding Lenin's statue at the Jadavpur New Market, on the way to Kolkata's Jadavpur University (JU). Among few institutes in India where Marx still gets discussed as strongly among students as the marks in their semester exams. And the Left is far from a metaphorical red flag.

Only that some of the campus buildings itself are coloured in white and blue of the TMC. Which isn't a coincidence. TMC's Mamta Banerjee government in Kolkata announced property tax exemption in 2014-15 if you painted your buildings in her party colours. State-funded JU perhaps took the more practical route.

Graffiti on campus walls slamming partisanship

We turn right, into the campus, to figure what's left of the Left. When asked if JU is JNU of Kolkata, locals promptly correct, "Oh, no; JNU is the JU of Delhi! The ideological battlelines drawn in student politics of JU are still between the Left, and ultra-Left, namely parties like AIDSO, FUCI, and SFI, all of which bear various shades of communism, from Stalinist, Maoist, to the more mainstream."

It's another matter that the state has still not green-lit a student union election on campus since 2019. The colours of the buildings don't matter, once you're hit by graffities all over, from "smashing patriarchy", "down with partisanship", "free Kurds", "environmentalism without class struggle is gardening," invoking everywhere, Kranti revolution of Che Guevera, Bhagat Singh, et al.

People, from the outside, might think of JU's idealism as some sort of an elitist bubble. But it's really driven by students from oppressed classes, voicing dissent. Which is allowed. In fact, actively encouraged by teachers, scholars, and authorities. "The space for debates is diminishing on other campuses. It's about brainstorming, rather than brainwashing, and everybody is allowed their opinion," says Srijan Bhattacharya, the ‘Young Turk' CPM candidate from Jadavpur, who's just returned from canvassing in the rural parts.

Jadavpur is both the university and the constituency it's on. Mamata has been elected from here to the Lok Sabha in the past. As has the doyen Somnath Chatterjee. The turning point for the Left, however, was when the CM Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee lost to TMC from Jadavpur in the 2011 Assembly elections, ending a 34-year CPI (M) rule.

Graffiti on the university walls

The party has been on a terminal decline since. Landing zero seats in the 2021 state elections. As with Congress, this Left-shaped hole has, evidently been filled by the BJP in Bengal since. "There is a silent makeover happening within the CPM," says its candidate, Saira Shah Halim from the neighbouring South Kolkata constituency.

By which she means, "We're looking at nominating young, credible faces. There is even a digital push in the campaign. Something the Left had altogether stayed away from. Look at me, even I'm making reels!"

Saira's posters across South Kolkata urge for a vote for CPM, supported by the Congress, in equal font size - making her the face of INDIA bloc, that Mamta had walked out of. This Congress-Left bonhomie also bears irony in the context of JU.

There's a popular story that we get Srijan to recall, "Snehansu Acharya, an accomplished barrister, also from a zamindar family, was jailed by the Congress government for his communist affiliations in the 1950s. The CM BC Roy asked him to hand over land for education. He did and then returned to jail. This is where JU presently stands."

Students at the canteen prefer not to be quoted on their politics in the press. One of them, choosing anonymity, because he plans to sit for the civil services exam, says, "It's not important to be identified as Left. Some do. Some don't. The point is to voice, and deliver. Nobody is apolitical here."

There is visible support for young Srijan, once a popular student leader at JU when you ask around in the food stalls outside the campus.

Graffiti on a shutter, ‘smashing patriarchy'

Campaigning for a month, with another month to go - Jadavpur polls on June 1 - Srijan is placed opposite young Saayoni Ghosh, a former actor, with the TMC, and BJP's think-tank ideologue, Anirban Ganguly, who's also written a book on Narendra Modi.

Saira, in South Kolkata, is up against two sitting MPs - the incumbent, Mala Roy, from TMC, and BJP's Debasree Chaudhuri, a former minister, who's been brought over from Raiganj constituency.

Saira says, "The issue here is of corruption. Both BJP and TMC got exposed with electoral bonds, while CPM still works on fees from party members. Look at the scams exposed during the TMC - teacher recruitment, land-grab…"

She adds, "In the 2022 by-polls, I beat the BJP candidate, while I lost to BJP's Babul Supriyo, from the Ballygunge Assembly seat." Securing a respectable second position would still be a success of some sort for the Left.